A few years ago I had to answer some searching questions to a Customs official about a book which I had with me, printed in Latin, and which the offi… - Robertson Davies

It was suggested by the late Alfred Knopf that books should be graded like eggs, and that publishing houses should not offer as First Class what they well know to be Fifth. But of course publishers cannot agree about standards for grading, and even if they could, writers would shriek like mandrakes uprooted if their work were sent into the world marked anything less than Strictly Fresh.

...the Conservative party found him an embarrassment because he was apt to criticize the party leader in public, the Liberals naturally wanted to defeat him, and the newspapers were out to get him. It was a dreadful campaign on his part, for he lost his head, bullied his electors when he should have wooed them, and got into a wrangle with a large newspaper, which he threatened to sue for libel. He was defeated on election day so decisively that it was obviously a personal rather than a political rejection.

I suppose everybody has these softheaded spells, when they think it would be fun to live in a small town. They pass quickly, of course.